John Kingston Associate
Professor 404-712-9507
(O) |
|
The primary
focus of my research is exploring the interrelationships between early humans
and their environment. The central question this research addresses is ‘Why
did humans evolve?’. Evolution is essentially an ecological process
and as we seek adaptive explanations for the many innovations that characterize
our lineage, we require detailed reconstruction of the ecological conditions
that selected for these characteristics in the past. As the number and types
of fossil humans discovered over the last decade has increased dramatically,
so have the questions requiring an ecological explanation. How did past environments
select for and support such a diversity of early hominid species and their
diagnostic morphologies? Did the different (sub)species of early hominids,
especially forms that shared a landscape, occupy different ecological niches?
Which habitats are most relevant for interpreting human evolution and which
are linked with specific evolutionary events? How good were early hominids
at ranging through and utilizing resources in different ecosystems? Current
models provide fertile ground from which to generate these sorts of questions
regarding links between hominid adaptation and selective forces, but we lack
the necessary paleoecological data to test these hypotheses.
My goals are to gather more empirical data relevant to reconstructing the
landscape of our ancestors and develop alternate or additional models that
are more evidentiary based. Specifically, the aim of my research agenda is
to develop, refine, and integrate direct or proxy paleoecological evidence
to increase our understanding of the co-evolution of community ecology, diet,
and life history parameters in hominid evolution. The foundation of my approach
is built on a cross-disciplinary background in paleoanthropology, field geology,
biogeochemistry, ecology, and evolutionary theory, involving field investigations
in Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, South Asia, and North America and biogeochemical
laboratory research. Emerging evidence is shifting our perspective of early
human ecology away from traditional models, invoking a gradual shift from
closed to open ecosystems, towards the view of a much more complex and dynamic
interplay of evolutionary and environmental factors in our evolution.